The Official Qualifying for the AUTOPOLIS GT 3 Hours RACE, Round 7 of the 2025 AUTOBACS SUPER GT, was held on October 18th at AUTOPOLIS (one lap 4,674 m) in Oita Prefecture. As the Official Qualifying time progressed, the drizzle of rain turned into full rain and the track condition changed from Dry to full Wet condition. In these conditions. The GT500 class saw Sasaki in the No. 3 Niterra MOTUL Z (Daiki Sasaki / Atsushi Miyake) run fast despite the rain to take his second pole position in 2 years. In the GT300 class, Kobayashi in the No. 7 CARGUY FERRARI 296 GT3 (Zak O’Sullivan / Rikuto Kobayashi) took his second straight pole position following the one at the previous round at SUGO. These two teams will start at the front of their respective grids for the race on October 19th.
□Official Qualifying weather: Rain｜Track: Dry / Wet｜ Air temperature / Track surface temperature at the start of GT300 Q1: 20℃/24℃, at the start of GT300 Q2: 20℃/24℃, at the finish: 20℃/23℃.
The weather report for this day at AUTOPOLIS originally called for rain in the afternoon, and for the morning Official Practice the weather was unstable with rain falling from time to time. Although there was a short period of rainfall before the GT300 Qualifying Q1 session for Group A began at 2:45, the track surface remained Dry.
The GT300 class Q1 sessions were run in two groups, A and B, divided based on the teams’ series point standings as of the previous round. Group A was competed by 14 cars. As soon as the course was opened, all the cars took to the track. After proceeding to warm up their tires, the first to record a time of 1’44.056 was the winner of this season’s Round 5 at Suzuka, the No. 7 CARGUY Ferrari 296 GT3 (Zak O’Sullivan), and this became the target time for the other cars. In response to this, the No. 61 SUBARU BRZ R&D SPORT (Takuto Iguchi) ran a time of 1’44.514, followed by the No. 56 REALIZE NISSAN MECHANIC CHALLENGE GT-R (Joao Paulo de Oliveira) in 3rd position with a time of 1’44.700. Eventually, car No. 7 would qualify on to Q2 with the fastest time, while 9th position went to the No. 26 ANEST IWATA RC F GT3 (Igor Omura Fraga) as the final car to qualify on to Q2. Meanwhile, car No. 61, which had originally qualified in 2nd position suffered from machine trouble while entering the S Corner, causing it to belch out white smoke and come to a stop at trackside.
Due to the time required to recover the car No. 61 and clean up the liquids spread across the track, the start of the afternoon session for Q1 Group A was delayed by 15 minutes to 3:18 in the afternoon. In the meantime, rain had begun to fall gradually. When the Group B session began, the 13 cars came out with their windshield wipers turned on as they began their warm-up laps. Here it was the No. 0 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 (Yuya Motojima) that had finished on top in the morning Official Practice came through to record another top time of 1’44.466. The other JLOC car, the No. 87 METALIVE S Lamborghini GT3 (Kosuke Matsuura) followed this with a time of 1’45.415.
After this, the other cars began to improve on their best lap times, but none were able to beat the time of car No. 0. Following in 2nd position with a time of 1’44.553 was the No. 5 MACHSYAKEN AIR BUSTER MC86 MACH GO （Yusuke Shiotsu), while in 3rd position stood the No. 18 UPGARAGE AMG GT3 (Takashi Kobayashi). Finishing in 10th position in Group B and thus failing to advance Q2 was the No. 777 D’station Vantage GT3 (Tomonobu Fujii) that ranked 4th in series point standing.
Following the GT500 class Q1 session, the GT300 class Q2 session began at 3:50 in the afternoon, which continued to be run in the rain that gradually stained the track black with water. Some teams changed to Wet-use tires, and some returned to their pit after one lap on the track. There they frantically changed to Wet-use tires and took other measures to cope with the changing conditions. The cars then ran warm-up laps before beginning their serious time attacks, and eventually some were able to run on slick tires once they were warmed up, and the cars that ran time attacks were able to improve on their times. Also, the car No. 61 that had suffered machine trouble in Q1 was unable to run in Q2.
One car that was able to improve on its times successfully was the No. 0 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure). It improved its times from 1’44.619 down to 1’44.070 to keep top position. However, at the very end No. 0 was beaten in a dramatic come-from-behind rush by Rikuto Kobayashi in the No. 7 CARGUY Ferrari 296 GT3, who broke through the 1’44 barrier with a top time of 1’43.496. Then, in the last minutes of the session, the No. 11 GAINER TANAX Z (Kazuki Oki) ran off the track and crashed into the barrier wall. With this the chassis was badly damaged, thus endangering it chances to run in tomorrow’s race.
When the Q2 session ended, Kobayashi in the No. 7 CARGUY FERRARI 296 GT3 (Zak O’Sullivan/Rikuto Kobayashi/Keita Sawa) had won his second consecutive pole position following the one in the previous round at SUGO. Finishing 2nd in the qualifying was the No. 0 VENTENY Lamborghini GT3 (Takashi Kogure/Yuya Motojima), while 3rd position went to the No. 2 HYPER WATER INGING GR86 GT (Yuui Tsutsumi/Hibiki Taira/Kazuhisa Urabe). As for the series point standing leader, the No. 65 LEON PYRAMID AMG (Naoya Gamou/Togo Suganami/Haruki Kurosawa), it will start tomorrow’s race from 4th position on the grid.
